Kain's Garden
by VladimirsAngel
Summary: The lord of all Nosgoth is spending too much time thinking in his throne room, and the impossible proves too strong a lure...at least for a while. Please R&R.


**KAIN'S GARDEN**

**Disclaimer: Legacy of Kain created and developed by Eidos. **

**_I have no real idea why I wrote this. It probably shows. But I'm glad I did. Let me know what you think if you read. _**

At the foot of Kain's throne in Nosgoth, there are flagstones: big ones, dragged up here by human slaves whose muscles tore and backs twisted like old trees as they moved them. They are not made from the most expensive stone available, as after the chair and pillars were carved there was very little of that left: but they are certainly made from the heaviest and most hard-wearing stone available. Rumour has it that Kain chose the stone himself purely because it _was_ the heaviest and it amused him to watch the struggles of the mortals who carried it. The flagstones still, in some places, bear the marks of the wooden pegs driven in by the masons who cut them from the mountainside.

They have been scrubbed a lot.

To one side of the throne itself is a shallow hollow, about the size of a coin. Here the point of the Reaver rests when Kain is tired of holding it. The only reason the hollow isn't deeper is that he does not tire of the sword very often of late. He lays it across his knees instead, or leans forward, chin rested on his smooth talons, with the blade resting down his spine.

Here also is the flagstone marked by Kain's cloven feet: more a discolouration than a true wearing away of the stone. The surface of this flag is scuffed and dusty where the vampire, bored or irritated, paws at the ground like an overheated bull in the arena. It is swept reasonably often, although only as often as Kain goes out, as there is no slave, human or vampire, who would try to perform the task while he was there.

He has not been going out very often, either. A subject close to his dead heart has been worrying him, and he spends a lot of time in the throne room, thinking, trying to solve a puzzle with only half the pieces.

To the left and slightly behind the throne is the flagstone with the bloodstains on. It is not, by any stretch of the imagination, the only stone in Kain's chambers to be stained in this manner, but it is noteworthy in that it is the only one which has retained the stain after multiple scrubbing sessions. Ever-useful rumour again tells the story that this is Kain's blood, spilt once and once only during a fight, the blood of the god.

It is, in truth, human blood and the method by which it got there quite usual, in a vampire's stronghold, but legend is so much more virulent than fact and Kain encourages it for that very reason.

He also, somewhat to the surprise of his lieutenants, encourages the scrubbing.

Washing anything with water is a touchy process in Nosgoth. When the very rivers and wells could arm the peasant human population for a riot, it pays a clever vampire to be watchful. Yesterday the flagstones on the throne room were scrubbed with heavy brushes under the careful and not-particularly-generous eye of Rahab, who stood to one side as the stone was sluiced down with a bucket and then almost immediately covered with cloths to soak up the damp.

Rahab is not to know that Kain has his reasons for encouraging the cleaning of his throne room, and the reason he would never know is that he has never sat in the throne. Kain's sons are not irreparably stupid: brash, arrogant and power-hungry though they undoubtedly are, they would never be foolish enough to sit in the master's chair. Not when his sense of smell is so acute he can tell an eagle from a peregrine at three hundred feet….not even Raziel, the master's favourite, has ever really considered trying to usurp Kain's seat.

But if you were foolish enough to imagine yourself as Kain, if you sat in the throne and gazed down not forwards at your terrified and loyal court, but slightly back at the floor in the shadow of the throne, you would see that one of the massive flags has cracked, just a little. A tiny hairline crack at its outmost reach, widening to the width of an arrowshaft as it hugs the base of the chair.

And in the deepest shadow, right at the innermost edge of the broken stone, where by rights no light of any kind should ever fall, there is a tiny plant.

Words cannot accurately describe the thoughts that went through Kain's mind when he first noticed it. It had been an inutterably tedious evening, overseeing yet another power squabble between Dumah and Turel, (who were not to know that Kain had decided what to do with them five minutes after their entry into his chambers and was just letting them exhaust themselves arguing) and the old vampire's attention had wandered.

His gaze had idly followed the crack in the stone. Flaws in anything always interested him, whether they showed up a weak point or offered an unexpected strength. Almost hidden in the shadow, the single curl of the growing plant had stood out to Kain's roving gaze very clearly: an organic, curving irregularity amongst his severe, heavy stones.

Something unexpected. Something new growing where by rights nothing should grow unless Kain wished it to!

Kain had summarily dismissed his sons and then ate dinner until he was alone in the echoing hall at last and didn't have to feel wary about getting down on his knees to have a closer look.

The seedling was perhaps half an inch tall, and curling in the way a bean sprout curls. The stalk was pale and wan like vampire skin and the tiny, nascent leaves were jet black. Kain almost flattened his massive bulk to the floor to peer at the spot where the stalk was thrusting through the stone. There was a single tiny droplet of human blood, strayed from Kain's meal earlier, adorning the plant like a jewel.

_Did you crack this stone all by yourself, little rebel?_

_I don't like rebels._

He reached out his heavy claws, prepared to slam the tiny plant flat. At the last moment, he stopped, choosing instead to tip up the leaves carefully with the very tip of his talon. Nothing should live in the halls of the dead. No natural light, no water, nothing to sustain even the smallest spark of life. This little thing was impossible.

Kain gave a short, humourless bark of laughter, and got to his feet, making a few mental notes. An emperor surely could wish nothing more than to have the impossible under his control, and it _was_ under his control. He could enjoy the knowledge that in the shadow of his brilliance a miracle was flourishing, knowing every time he saw it that he was superior to it, that it relied on him to protect it from destruction. Miracles are, after all, fragile and rare.

And so, every smoke-dulled day and choking night, Lord Kain lies across his chair, occasionally scraping one cloven foot on the flagstones in boredom, as his sons fight amongst themselves to be considered greatest in his eyes. It is a pointless exercise on their parts. Raziel, the firstborn, is the only one of them who draws Kain's attention for more than a moment, and indeed it is he who has been preying on the old vampire's mind lately.

Rahab is intimidating Melchiah verbally in that low, intellectual drawl that always manages to cow the younger vampire. Kain barely suppresses a roll of his eyes in disgust. He looks down instead to see how his garden is faring.

Encouraged by the regular sluicing of water across the flagstones, the little plant is almost two inches tall now. The leaves are opening, and they are not black as Kain first expected, but white like blind fish in underground water, white like the belly of a frog.

Instinctively, Kain knows that like him, this little plant is so used to darkness that direct sunlight would burn it, scorch the delicate leaves. He watches it out of eyes narrowed to slits. The lieutenants, still sniping amongst themselves, wonder if he has fallen asleep. They become less careful of their actions, and two things happen in one moment: Rahab cuffs Melchiah so that the younger vampire skids across the floor to the foot of the throne, almost crushing the tiny plant; and Dumah happens to whisper to Zephon that he thinks Raziel has been slain, as the oldest child of Kain has not been seen at council for weeks. Kain's eyes snap open, and he roars in fury.

In the days that follow, as Kain spends ever more time alone and contemplative in his chambers and Dumah retreats further into his territory to nurse his wounds, the plant continues to grow. As it grows, so do Kain's concerns. Raziel has been gone a long time. The firstborn has always been reckless, rebellious - perhaps he took one chance too many, relied on one too many miracles.

He shifts position on his cold throne, feeling the comfortable smoothed edges where he has sat for so many years, and idly looks down over one side to check on the plant.

His eyes widen.

_Impossibility on impossibility…_

The stalk and two sets of pale leaves are crowned by a flower. It had happened so inconspicuously Kain had never noticed the bud forming, never saw the petals unfolding, although it had been within a few feet of him all the time. The flower is tiny, but perfectly formed: six petals, shaped like the leaves, but tinted pale beige and speckled darkly towards the tips with brown.

He gets down on his knees to look at the flower more closely, even reaches out his hand to touch the edges of the petals. It is no bigger than the iris of his eye, and looks very vulnerable against the huge curved length of his claw.

It is perfect, symmetrical. It lies against Kain's hand serenely. The garden is looking to reproduce itself, and in doing so has achieved more than its gardener.

Kain's eyes narrow, as an unfamiliar anger begins to sweep along his veins.

_I nurture you and this is how you repay me? By…by…_

He curls his claws into a fist and brings the fist down with such force that the flagstone, weakened along the crack, splits in two. It is only in the following few seconds, when he lifts his bunched fist to the dim light to regard the smashed remnants of the flower and the smears of pale sap across his claws, that he feels the smallest pang of regret at what he has destroyed. He backs away from the broken flagstone and sits down in the throne, picking up the Reaver and brushing the ruined petals away on the hilt.

"My lord!"

It is Rahab's voice, calling from the doorway. The brothers are all here, walking in in single file to surround the throne, taking up their customary places.

"My lord…Raziel has returned."

There is a knowing edge to Rahab's voice that Kain doesn't care for. He looks past his son to the figure stalking in behind the others. It is indeed Raziel, his cape seeming oddly hunched over his shoulders.

Without even knowing why, Kain feels his claws unconsciously curl back into a fist.


End file.
